Chris Tolhurst

If you thought the way Australian cities are planned and developed is rarely subjected to change, you haven't been keeping abreast of recent shifts.

Urban planning is going through its biggest shake-up in years and there are a host of implications for those who buy and sell property.

Since the 1970s, the focus has been on tighter regulation and environmental restrictions in the planning arena.

Now the pendulum is swinging back towards the centre.

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The reason? Voters in local government elections around Australia are zeroing in on the economy. Electors increasingly understand that no development means no jobs.

Local pollies and administrators are at the forefront of the new thinking. Victoria's Planning Minister, Matthew Guy, wants Melbourne to become a ''20-minute city'' with every suburb within a short commute of everyday services and jobs. Last month, he released a strategic blueprint for Melbourne that is likely to further streamline development.

The report says ''one of Melbourne's competitive advantages is the amount of land available for development in strategic central city locations, such as Fishermans Bend, E-Gate [in West Melbourne] and the Arden precinct''.

NSW Planning Minister Brad Hazzard is also stirring the pot. He wants to replace 33 years of state law with a system that gives communities an upfront say in the make-up of their built environments but strips away avenues of objection once the plan is set.

The aim is to end uncertainty for property developers when they buy land without knowing if they will get approval to develop.

The breaking-with-the-past strategy is also being felt in Queensland, where local government elections in March swept a new type of politician to power. On the Gold Coast, sporting champion Ron Clarke has been replaced as mayor by engineer and businessman Tom Tate.

Cr Tate has launched a construction stimulus program to create 10,000 construction sector jobs in four years. He is also cutting red tape for developers, with council planning staff now delegated to process smaller projects quickly.

Another newly elected mayor, Sunshine Coast Regional Council's Mark Jamieson, believes local government has made it too hard for private investors to create employment opportunities.

Cr Jamieson, a leading businessman, says economic sustainability must play a key role in planning. To be successful, a city has to be able to secure investment and exploit economic outcomes from major development while retaining its prized community and lifestyle attributes, he says.

For coastal Queensland communities, the link between development and jobs is even more important than it is in the larger cities. Good planning delivers jobs, housing and public amenity without sacrificing the environment and society.

In many centres, there's a stepped-up focus on strategic planning, which is research-based and takes the long view on the orderly development of areas. This is likely to lead state governments to exercise more power over local government and individual communities.

What will it mean for property owners? You can expect early consultation but quicker approval processes. The trend to increased housing density is likely to intensify.

Urban design standards may also be raised. Kirsty Kelly, chief executive of the Planning Institute of Australia, says there is an Australia-wide change in the planning area and more emphasis on design.

She says cities have previously been ''let down'' by urban design and many need bigger, safer and more integrated public spaces.

15 comments so far

The aim of reducing uncertainty for developers will never be achieved. We already have a system in Queensland where development is encouraged (self/code assessment, no public objection rights) or discouraged (impact assessment, limited objection rights), and is improving with the current round of new planning schemes, despite the new State government frustrating the process. Developers create the uncertainty for themselves, they will always want to build more than is encouraged (hence, the impact assessment, delay prone path), that is where that lovely risk/reward cream comes from.

The aim of planning legislation should be to develop great public spaces with affordable buildings, rather than trying to create "certainty" in an industry where there has never been, nor ever will be any.

Commenter

Ned

Location

Brisbane

Date and time

November 10, 2012, 9:58AM

You are right. People have consistently been let down by poor planning. This is set to change with increased liberalisation of the development market.

Business people who "know how it all works" in some sort of self-referencing liberal dogma are set to override people with years of tertiary education and planning experience to make decisions regarding what constitutes appropriate planning measures. This is utterly reprehensible and best of luck to the rest of us when we see already loose at best planning measures opened up for open slather by the "socially conscious," "community-aware" development corporations who happily slap on and run from these "lifestyle centres" like Pakenham, Caroline Springs and Craigieburn. Leave it to the developers they said, it will be great they said. Look at Docklands and Anywhere-beyond-20km of Melbourne's CBD they said and what do we have? Leading communities where you have to own and operate a vehicle for mobility, live in endless, mindnumbing residential sprawl with distant schools, doctors and community facilities. No thanks, I can already imagine how royally they're going to mess up Fisherman's Bend in some sort of soulless, concreted wasteland. More wasted opportunities...

Commenter

carltonstudent

Location

Date and time

November 10, 2012, 10:29AM

Couldn't agree more. I'm a liberal voter but this idea is a distaster in the making.

Commenter

Jarrod

Location

Melbourne

Date and time

November 12, 2012, 9:40AM

Good luck with that. Neoliberalism in the planning sphere is on its way out: all you need to do is look at the curriculum and see that current methodology in research, design and theory is distinctly left. What is being done now in planning is an approach embedded in government psyche two decades ago. What we're learning now is how to overcome these contemporary barriers, some of which are yet to be enforced as mentioned in this article. The only value in this article is the point raised within the last two lines.

In short, a well-planned space will result in economic prosperity regardless of a centrist push towards development. When you start segmenting your objectives and proposition a swing back to the center for the sake of $$$$, that's when you start creating community which fall apart after 10 years and turn into empty, lifeless precincts. Planning must be holistic and cater to all aspects of the community, and dare I say it, but infrastructure to support these desired economies should probably come first.

Commenter

Urban planner

Location

Melbourne

Date and time

November 10, 2012, 1:17PM

"The trend to increased housing density is likely to intensify."

Good grief. We're destroying our suburbs so greedy developers can make more money. What a disaster.

Commenter

Dano

Location

Date and time

November 10, 2012, 7:03PM

It's not only so the developers can make more money, though that's a large part of it. It's also the government (Labor or Liberal) who is absolutely committed to maintaining the housing bubble at all costs; hence the massive immigration policy.

Commenter

Don't Prop Up the Ponzi

Location

Date and time

November 12, 2012, 10:01AM

Dano, we're not destroying our suburbs, we're changing them - and thank God for that! Building a city of nothing but 1/4 acre blocks was an excusable mistake back in the 50s and 60s, but it's not excusable now. We need smaller houses for smaller households (families with children are now a minority) and we need them to be built in place of the 1/4 acre blocks of which we have way too many. There's still a place for the traditional 1/4 acre, but only as one type among many others. 1/4 acre sprawl means car dependency, which means increasing traffic congestion, which means gridlock, which means no way to get a life, which means the end of our quality of life.

Out with the old and in with the new! Suburbs for the 21st century, not for the 1960s! We don't need all those big back yards, but we do need to be close to where we are going. And remember, the so-called 'greedy developers' are the ones we need to build it for us. If we want to have a city worth living in, we will need lots of 'greedy developers' to build it,so hope that there's lots of them out there. Remember, developers only make money if people are willling to pay for what they build. There is negative equity in the outer fringe suburbs but huge prices further in - that's the giveaway. Our future depends on higher density.

Commenter

Kris

Location

Suburbia

Date and time

November 12, 2012, 5:35PM

You're telling me that regulations were actually in place for the atrocities we call housing estates? Wow...what are they going to look like with even less community oversight?

Commenter

Erik

Location

Date and time

November 12, 2012, 9:04AM

Developers will allways have the upper hand because they pour money into the coffers of the various political parties, so the politicians in order to keep the funds flowing give way to every unsustainable development put forward - just objecting to a few to make it look good.Some of the new estates are absolute horrors and the houses are cheap boxes with upper floors of rendered blueboard which will not stand the test of time, are expensive to heat and cool and totally inpractical for the dusty expanses of new estates. Further, inner and mid city councils are allowing out of place new for old devlopemnts which are totally stupid. take a look around this area, Whitehourse, Manningham - old homes being demolished and multiple unitis or multi storey devlopments with flimsy pine frames, horrible brick cladding and upper floors of blueboard - how can these places have any character or add to or enhance the living of the occupants - they are just boxes. Don't we run archicture courses any more??

Commenter

JW

Location

Doncaster East

Date and time

November 12, 2012, 11:03AM

Chris, I don't know where you get your information from. It sounds more like government and developers spin than fact. Which local in their right mind would be happy to have higher density in their back yard? Absolute bolderdash!